Biomechanics of metastatic disease in the vertebral column.

Metastatic disease in the vertebral column compromises the structural stability of the spine leading to increased risk of fracture. The complex patterns of osteolytic and osteoblastic disease within the bony spine have motivated a multimodal approach to better characterize the biomechanics of tumor-involved bone. This review presents our current understanding of the biomechanical behavior of metastatically involved vertebrae, and experimental and computational image-based approaches that have been employed to quantify structural integrity in preclinical models with translation to clinical data sets.